
Journal: Science & Justice
Published: 2020
Primary Author: Sharon Kelley
Secondary Authors: Brett Gardner, Daniel C.Murrie, Karen D.H.Pan, Karen Kafadar
Type: Publication
Research Area: Latent Print
Proficiency testing has the potential to serve several important purposes for crime laboratories and forensic science disciplines. Scholars and other stakeholders, however, have criticized standard proficiency testing procedures since their implementation in laboratories across the United States. Specifically, many experts label current proficiency tests as non-representative of actual casework, at least in part because they are not sufficiently challenging (e.g., [1], [2], [3], [4]. In the current study, we surveyed latent print examiners (n = 322) after they completed a Collaborative Testing Services proficiency test about their perceptions of test items. We also evaluated respondents’ test performance and used a quality metric algorithm (LQMetrics) to obtain objective indicators of print quality on the test. Results were generally consistent with experts’ concerns about proficiency testing. The low observed error rate, examiner perceptions of relative ease, and high objective print quality metrics together suggest that latent print proficiency testing is not especially challenging. Further, examiners indicated that the test items that most closely resembled real-world casework were also the most difficult and contained prints of the lowest quality. Study findings suggest that including prints of lower quality may increase both the difficulty and representativeness of proficiency testing in latent print examination.
Related Resources


Forensic Footwear: A Retrospective of the Development of the MANTIS Shoe Scanning System
July 10, 2025
There currently are no shoe-scanning devices developed in the United States that can operate in a real-world, variable-weather environment in …

Examiner consistency in perceptions of fingerprint minutia rarity
July 10, 2025
Friction ridge examiners (FREs) identify distinctive features (minutiae) in fingerprints and consider how rare these observed minutiae are in their …